Retailers may sell goods to customers through multiple channels of distribution. Large retail chains may include hundreds or thousands individual brick-and-mortar stores located across the country and, in certain examples, the world. Such chains may also operate an e-commerce business, through which customers may purchase items online. The e-commerce business may offer many of the same items provided at the brick-and-mortar stores, as well as additional “online only” items.
The retailer may request (i.e., order) various versions of an item from a vendor based on forecasted sales of the item at each of the retail stores. For example, the retailer may order a t-shirt in several different sizes and different colors, where the forecasted sales of each size and color may be different at each retail store. Likewise, the retailer may order these same versions of the item for their online business, as well as additional online only versions. In the t-shirt example, the online site may offer additional colors and/or sizes not available in the brick-and-mortar stores.
The vendors ship the items to the individual brick-and-mortar retail stores and to one or more online distribution centers using assortment packs. In general, the assortment shipped to any individual retail store, or to the online distribution centers, should match the anticipated demand at that store or distribution center as closely as possible. For large retail chains that operate hundreds or thousands of brick-and-mortar stores as well as a large online business, and that offer hundreds or thousands of different products, assortment pack planning is a complex technical problem.